


Soul Enough

by Quinnoid



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Alcohol, Dissociation, Happy Ending, Other, Soulmate AU, except Zolf lost (?) his soul to Poseidon, pre-relationship for the most part, so canon typical issues with gods
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:48:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28374909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quinnoid/pseuds/Quinnoid
Summary: He watched as people filtered in and out, and how Cel interacted with each of them, and he very pointedly ignored the handwritten labels on the bottles and tins they pulled out. Fate was cruel and he had no interest in fueling it. If he did, he’d have to accept that he might have fallen in love with Cel if he'd met them back before France, could have been happy with them. He could do that when they weren’t in danger of witnessing the fallout.OrWhat if Zolf lost his soul before he met his soulmate? What would losing your soul do to soulmates and soul marks?
Relationships: Celiquillithon "Cel" Sidebottom & Zolf Smith, Celiquillithon "Cel" Sidebottom/Zolf Smith
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13





	Soul Enough

**Author's Note:**

> I still have CelZolf brainrot so bad. Also the mad alchemist bar is also back bc it's a fun sandbox and I like making castles.
> 
> Zolf is sort of.. distant and dissociated, so I went ahead and tagged it, but it's a side effect of losing his soul rather than depression.

Cel was born without soul marks. It wasn’t uncommon for the longer lived races, though their first three didn’t appear until much, much later than the others in their village. It was the fourth one that stumped them though. They were probably 47 or so when they first noticed the mark: a small, circular symbol tattooed just inside their upper left arm. It was different from their first three, fractured and blurred like a tattoo much older than any of the ones criss-crossed over their back and arms, and it was frozen, whereas their others were constantly in motion. They eventually found out it was the mark of the Cult of Poseidon in Europe, but none of the experiments they did yielded any promising results, although they had a few theories they were quite fond of. Until the day it disappeared, it was their favorite puzzle, one that always buzzed in the back of their mind, though it remained frustratingly unsolved.

The day Zolf accepted Poseidon as his god, his first soul mark appeared. The bubbling potion with a hand-scrawled label was bright and clear against the array of muddled, faded tattoos that banded his forearms. He recognized the letters but not the language, so he had no idea what it meant. No one else seemed to know either, and after a time, he decided he’d let fate figure it out. It was a bright spot of hope on rough nights, a promise no one could take away from him, not even the gods. Not until the day Poseidon took his soul as payment. All he could remember as his soul was wrenched from his body was the mark on his arm fracturing and dissolving. After that, Zolf just drifted aimlessly, nothing and no one to moor himself to. He was barely more than a shell of a person until the day he met his soulmate.

~~***~~

Zolf had been wandering through Hiroshima for a few weeks when he came across the slightly charred, slightly wonky, extra staticky wooden sign with a vaguely familiar scrawl over the door of the bar. The building that housed The Mad Alchemist was tucked into an industrial area outside of the main city, and it was blessedly quiet for the time of evening. The sun had just begun to set, streaking the sky in brilliant reds and purples that Zolf hadn’t been able to appreciate in a while. When he stepped up to the door, a tall half-elf in a lab coat burst backwards through it with a cloud of thick, black smoke, coughing and spluttering curses that made even his ears burn with a bit of shame.

“Spirits sake! Heh. Oh!” They turned around and about jumped out of their skin when they noticed Zolf. “Sorry lil buddy! Hi there! Were you, uhm, did you want to come in? I didn’t actually blow anything up and, and if you uhm, if you give me just a second, I can clear the smoke and-”

Zolf blinked up at them, already starting to get a bit lost in the eddy of words. They seemed to notice how quickly he faded out of the conversation and paused.

“Sorry! Sorry.” They took a breath and extended their hand. “Cel Sidebottom, they/them, alchemical engineer and owner of The Mad Alchemist, my bar!”

Zolf, slightly bewildered, took their hand and shook it lightly. Their skin was soft and cool against his. “Uh, Zolf, and he’s fine. Pirate, ex-pirate? Uh, yeah.” 

“Gotcha! Well, Mr. Zolf, ex-pirate, would you like a drink? First one’s on the house.” Cel gave him a once over that seemed a bit more than friendly and smiled warmly at him. Zolf sighed inwardly. He’d been about to head inside anyway, and there wasn’t anything better for him to do. Besides, the little feeling of.. Something nice that had bloomed in his chest when they smiled at him spurred him on. 

“Sure.” He nodded. Cel pulled the door open, and another puff of black smoke floated out, curling around his foot. After a moment’s hesitation, Zolf followed them inside and looked around. The interior was only a bit like what he expected and not at all like the sign suggested. Aside from the wisps of smoke still puffing out from an empty shot glass on the counter, the place was almost sterile, a somehow perfect mix of chemical lab and homely. “This is.. nice.”

“Thanks! I built most of it myself.” Cel smiled again. They stepped behind the bar after giving the room a fond smile and turned back to Zolf. “Now. What would you like?”

Zolf blinked again. He didn’t like getting asked this sort of question anymore. “I uh, I don’t really- Whatever you like?” 

Cel’s eyes lit up, and they grinned something sharp and a little dangerous looking. “Whatever I like? Are you sure?”

“I mean, yeah. I don’t really like.. Yeah.” Zolf tried to give them a small smile and clambered into a seat. 

Cel’s grin faltered for just a second, the look on their face somewhere between quizzical and concerned, but they recovered quickly. “How about I start you with one of my personal favorites?” When Zolf nodded, they smirked a bit and pulled a bottle of something from under the bar. “So, ex-pirate. What do you do now?”

“In between jobs.” Zolf said quietly. Cel raised an eyebrow but didn’t push him for anything as they turned away and grabbed a tin of small sticks with a handwritten label that made him freeze when he saw it. The writing on it was almost identical to the writing on his soul mark. He shook his head vigorously. It couldn’t be. “S-sorry. My ship was uh, well, the captain and a few others were arrested, and I took it as a sign to get outta the business fast.” 

“Mm.” Cel nodded, focused more on pouring out two shots of whiskey. They snapped one of the sticks in half, dropped one in each drink, and passed one to him just as it began to bubble and smoke ominously. Zolf raised his eyebrows. “What’s this?”

“It’s a smokeshot. Give it a try if you’d like.” They picked their glass up and paused when Zolf began to consider his. “Oh and  _ don’t _ drink the stick.” With another smirk, Cel tipped their shot back and swallowed. When they set the glass down, they shivered. “Ooh. Always a weird feeling.” 

Zolf shrugged and tipped his drink back, catching the stick in his teeth and swallowing the whiskey. The combination of alcohol and alchemical smoke burned pleasantly down his throat, but it was taking some getting used to. He spit the stick back into the glass and set it down with a small smile. “That was.. Good.” A puff of smoke followed his words and he jolted.

“All good! That happens sometimes!” Cel chuckled. “Glad you liked it though. Another?” 

“Sure.” Zolf passed them a silver piece that they took hesitantly and glanced around the little bar again. Most of the smoke had settled across the floor, adding to the strange atmosphere of the empty bar. “So uh. Not busy?”

“Well, I’m not technically open yet. The aeroship techs work pretty late, so I usually open whenever they show up.”

“Oh.” Zolf frowned at the drink Cel slid in front of him. Just whiskey this time, it looked like. He appreciated that. “Why’d you let me in then?”

Cel considered the question for a moment as they shrugged out of their lab coat. Immediately, his eyes were drawn to the myriad of tattoos that circled their muscular arms and disappeared under the sleeves of their loose shirt. Zolf looked away and took a sip of his drink. “I’m not sure.”

They seemed a bit lost in thought, mumbling quietly to themself, so Zolf let them think in peace. Time passed in the same abstract way it had since his soul had been taken, too fast and too slow all at once. It still felt weird, like he wasn’t quite a part of the world he somehow still existed in. Pondering the events that had led up to his.. Unfortunate parting with Poseidon always gave him a headache, so he let the thoughts drift away.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door that startled both of them. Cel shook their head and jumped again when they saw Zolf still sitting at the bar, a little smile playing on his lips. “Mr. Zolf! What- I’m very sorry! I-”

“S’alright.” He cut them off. “Quiet’s nice.” 

“Yeah.. Sorry about just zoning out though. And uhm, it’s about to get pretty loud, so if you don’t want to stick around for that,” They gestured at the door where a group of various people in overalls were standing. “I hope you’ll stop by again. I enjoyed your company a lot, and I’d like, well, if you’d like to anyway. Yeah.” Cel laughed a little and shook their head. 

“Thanks.” Zolf replied. With one last smile at him, Cel slipped back into their coat and closed their eyes. He watched as a mask of some sort slid over their features, and when they opened their eyes, there was a slightly manic glint in them, and the smirk he’d seen earlier was back. Zolf decided he liked whatever persona they played.

The rest of the night passed in a haze of strange time. Cel dropped by occasionally to pass him a drink, always something different and always delicious. He watched as people filtered in and out, and how Cel interacted with each of them, and he very pointedly ignored the handwritten labels on the bottles and tins they pulled out. Fate was cruel and he had no interest in fueling it. If he did, he’d have to accept that he might have fallen in love with Cel if he'd met them back before France, could have been happy with them. He could do that when they weren’t in danger of witnessing the fallout. It was incredibly late when the last of the patrons left, stumbling slightly but still sober enough to walk back to wherever they lived. 

“I’m glad you stayed.” Cel said quietly as they wiped down the tables. Zolf wanted to say something back, but the words were stuck. “You seem.. I’m not sure. Familiar? I don’t know why though. Unless I met you in the Americas, which I suppose is a possibility but- Wait did I?”

Zolf shook his head. Cel’s brow furrowed. They shrugged out of their coat, folding it carefully and setting it gently on the bar, and sat down next to him. They yawned, and Zolf caught a glimpse of two pairs of long, sharp fangs where their canines would normally be. Or he was drunk. He was probably drunk. 

“Humor me?” Cel asked, looking down at the bar over folded fingers. Zolf nodded. “Do you have any soul marks?” He didn’t quite hide his grimace before they saw it. “Oh sorry! I- Forget I asked, I know it can be a, uhm, a sensitive subject.”

Zolf shrugged. “It’s fine. Not really sensitive. Just..” He trailed off with a sigh. He was fairly certain Cel had been his soulmate at this point. Everything just added up: the handwriting, their alchemical proclivities, the little feeling that had settled in the back of his throat. And Poseidon had ripped it all away from him. But, did he want to tell them, to hurt them the way he’d been hurt? No, he didn’t, but they also deserved to know. 

“Hey.” Cel interrupted his train of thought. They were looking at him, hazel eyes dark with worry and their chapped lip between their teeth. “Are you alright?”

They looked so earnest, so curious despite their concern, and that combined with the weight of an untellable thing broke his resolve.

“If I tell you, you won’t enjoy how this story ends.” He said darkly. Cel gave him a sad smile. 

“Seems like you might need to tell it though. Again, no pressure. Up to you. But if you’d like, well, bartenders tend to be good listeners.” They settled in their seat and laid their chin in their hand, not quite looking at Zolf. 

“Right. A while back, I was a sailor for the British Navy.” Zolf muttered. “There was an accident. We capsized, and everyone else.. Well Poseidon seemed to take a liking to me. Offered to save me if I joined the Cult. I noticed the mark about a week later, once I’d been dragged aboard the pirate ship. It was a potion, purple and bubbling with a handwritten label. Someone told me once it might be Elvish.” As he’d expected, Cel perked up, but they didn’t interrupt him. 

“Poseidon and I had our differences though. Weren’t quite a match, and I guess I didn't serve him well enough. I tried, I really did try, but.. It just ended bad. I think it was a year ago? The crew got taken in by the French. I got away but decided I was done with it all. Done with the sea, done with Poseidon, done with sailing. He, uh, he didn’t take it well. He did something- Well, he took it I think. My soul. Or something. Least, that’s what the Navigator said. And the mark just.. left.” 

“Oh.” Cel breathed. At some point, they had turned to face Zolf completely, eyes wide. He could practically hear the gears turning in their head as they put the pieces together. 

“Sorry.” He mumbled.

“Can I tell you something? Well, two things?” Cel asked, waving his apology aside. Zolf nodded. “That potion sounds a lot like a mutagen.  _ My  _ mutagen. It turns me into a bat.” The teeth suddenly made sense. “And when I was a bit younger, a soul mark showed up right here.” They tapped their left arm, where there was a blank circle amidst their tattoos just above their elbow. “It was frozen and fractured, and we don’t worship the same gods in the Americas, so it took me a long time to realize it was the Cult of Poseidon’s symbol. But it was about a year ago, I think, that it disappeared.”   
  


“Yeah.” Both were quiet for a long while. Zolf wasn’t sure what Cel was thinking, but now that the words were out, he felt terrible for telling them. For breaking something so.. personal, for telling them that they had a soulmate, once, but now.. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have.. I’ll let you be.” 

He started to stand up, but stopped when Cel spun to face him quickly. “Hang on! If, if you really want to go, you can, of course, I would never stop you, but.. You don’t have to. You can uhm, you can stay. If you’d like. I could..” They trailed off, and he watched the gears start turning again, watched their eyes go distant and their lips start moving around silent words. He really could have fallen in love with them. They blinked and their eyes refocused on Zolf. “I could help you, maybe. I won’t promise, but I’m a very good alchemist and well, I could try. And even if not, well.. Many people don’t worry about soul marks anyway. There’s nothing saying you can’t stick around.”

Zolf scratched absently at his arm. “You want me to stay?” 

“Yes. If you want.” Cel’s eyes bore into him intensely. 

“Even though we aren’t, you know?” 

“Who cares? It’s our life. I’ve been with plenty of people who weren’t my soulmates and I know people who’ve never met any of their soulmates. There’s no rule that says you have to be with your soulmate. And technically, you know, we are probably. Still soulmates. You just don’t have a soul. Or more likely, your soul was repressed somehow. I could-” Cel cut themself off with a sheepish grin. “Sorry. We can talk about that later. Just.. don’t worry about the soul stuff alright? I don’t mind either way.”

The feeling in the back of his throat grew, settled in his chest with a comforting weight, and he finally had a name for it: hope. Cel’s words wrapped around him like a warm blanket, and he smiled a genuine smile. 

“I think.. I’d like that.” He said. Cel’s smile was brighter than anything he’d seen in a long, long while. They took his hand and led him upstairs, where they had a nice flat set up. Cel offered him their bedroom, but he took the couch. Before they went to bed though, Zolf hesitantly pulled them down into a hug, and after a moment relishing in it, kissed their cheek. It felt.. good. It felt right. Zolf decided he didn’t mind whether he had his soul or not. Cel had soul enough for the both of them.

**Author's Note:**

> It's incredibly unlikely I'll write another chapter of this but it is v important to me that you know some of Cel's more accurate theories:  
> Soulmates aren't predetermined because life isn't, so soul marks can come and go.  
> Soul marks can probably change if the soulmate changes radically.  
> Soul marks are overrated and people don't need to base their whole lives on them (more of an opinion, but they like to include it)  
> Their soul mark for Zolf was always fractured and weird because while life isn't predetermined, Zolf and Poseidon's messy breakup was inevitable.  
> Zolf's soul mark for them was never fractured and weird because Cel didn't change, Zolf did.
> 
> Anyway! Thanks for reading! Please let me know if I missed any tags.


End file.
